7 votes

IT helpdesk request?

Posted by kingofsnake (edited )
Tags: microsoft, ask.help, hardware, hard disk drives, windows, tech support

I'm frankly all out of ideas on how to solve an issue, so I'm hoping that the Tildes community might have a suggestion for solving this issue.

I have an 8tb HDD that spins up and is recognized by windows when plugged into a USB HDD dock, but in another machine (also running windows 10) the drive can't be seen (**this is using data connections directly to the motherboard).

There is:

  • Nothing mechanically wrong with the drive as it reads/writes on the HDD dock.
  • I've tested the drive as an NTFS formatted drive and as unallocated.
  • Neither Disk Manager nor the bios sees the drive.
  • Multiple SATA cables and Power jacks tested on working drives and the non working drive.

Open to thoughts, prayers or possible solutions.

Thank you!

7 comments

  1. [2]
    patience_limited
    Link
    What vintage is the BIOS and chipset on the machine that can't see the 8 TB hard drive? Pre-UEFI (circa 2010) systems, if I recall correctly, can't see partitions larger than 2.2 TB due to 32-bit...

    What vintage is the BIOS and chipset on the machine that can't see the 8 TB hard drive? Pre-UEFI (circa 2010) systems, if I recall correctly, can't see partitions larger than 2.2 TB due to 32-bit address space limitations.

    7 votes
    1. kingofsnake
      (edited )
      Link Parent
      Good one - I hadn't thought of this. It's an Intel i76700k/GA-H170-D3HP and I haven't updated the bios since I bought the thing back in 2016. Odd that it'd affect only one of two very similar...

      Good one - I hadn't thought of this. It's an Intel i76700k/GA-H170-D3HP and I haven't updated the bios since I bought the thing back in 2016.

      Odd that it'd affect only one of two very similar drives from the same period, but it's possible.

      I've never updated a bios before. A little nervous. . .

      1 vote
  2. [3]
    xk3
    Link
    Just to be clear, you are using the USB HDD dock in both cases? What is the drive model number?

    when plugged into a USB HDD dock but in another machine
    ...
    Multiple SATA cables and Power jacks tested

    Just to be clear, you are using the USB HDD dock in both cases?

    What is the drive model number?

    3 votes
    1. [2]
      kingofsnake
      Link Parent
      Ah - no, the dock in the case where it works and a sata/PCI in the non working case. WD80EZZX and WD80EZAZ are both plugged into the machine with the ZX working and the AZ the one that's not...

      Ah - no, the dock in the case where it works and a sata/PCI in the non working case.

      WD80EZZX and WD80EZAZ are both plugged into the machine with the ZX working and the AZ the one that's not working on my 2016 motherboard but it works on a 2022 motherboard.

  3. [2]
    sparkle
    Link
    Does the non-working machine's BIOS have USB peripherals enabled? Some don't enable this by default. Do other USB drives/sticks show up? Does the USB dock work with ANY drive on the second machine...

    Does the non-working machine's BIOS have USB peripherals enabled? Some don't enable this by default. Do other USB drives/sticks show up?

    Does the USB dock work with ANY drive on the second machine that won't recognize the 8TB? Or is the issue limited to just this particular drive?

    If other drives work, that rules out the USB dock being the primary issue and shifts focus to some incompatibility between the drive itself and Windows. If it's not recognized at all though, I would guess an issue with that machine's USB controller - hardware failure or driver issue or misconfiguration, difficult to know.

    Out of curiosity, is it a USB-C dock? Is it possible that it's actually Thunderbolt and one computer supports it while the other doesn't, despite both connectors and receptacles being identical? Or any of the other stupid USB-C intricacies/incompatibilities?

    1 vote
    1. kingofsnake
      Link Parent
      I should have specified (now fixed) the non working setup has the HDD in question connected via the MB (along with 6 other drives plus one other HDD of similar model number and size - WD80EZZX and...

      I should have specified (now fixed) the non working setup has the HDD in question connected via the MB (along with 6 other drives plus one other HDD of similar model number and size - WD80EZZX and WD80EZAZ).

      I will try the dock on this system as well. Thanks for the tip.